Shepherdess feeding her dogs

A quiet night and good start with breakfast and catching up on emails in Tesco’s, Inverness. Today we are heading towards Aberdeen to catch up with fellow blipper shepherdess and her husband who moved here from Mull three weeks ago. The drive across to Elgin was laborious with slow moving traffic through the towns however preferable to battling with the almighty Hector yesterday.

It is wonderful to see J and A in their new home and to look around the house and land, imagine moving a farm! The countryside here has a different beauty to the west coast with rolling landscapes, rabbits, roe deer and a young owl to entertain us. And we had a few minutes of much needed rain, it poured although more is needed. A lovely evening eating (their own lamb from Mull, excellent,) and chatting. We can see life here will be very different and wish them both every success.

(When on Hoy a few days ago we met a young RSPB volunteer who was monitoring a pair of white tailed eagles, it was thought they were feeding young but the nest was hidden. Yesterday we heard on the radio that one chick was spotted, the volunteer will be ecstatic. It’s the first pair of white tails to breed in Orkney for 140 years).